The Magic Market Index for July 21st, 2017

Welcome to The Magic Market Index. This weekly article series documents the price changes of cards currently in print, and offers insight into what cards to invest in and what to ignore. This weekly article series covers all expansion sets and masterpiece series sets in Standard, from the time of their prerelease to the time of their rotation out of Standard. Currently, this covers all sets in the Battle for Zendikar, Shadows over Innistrad, Kaladesh, and Amonkhet blocks, as well as the Expeditions, Inventions, and Invocations masterpiece series sets. Promotional sets, special sets, pack foils, and non-set releases are not covered.

The Magic Market Index is a collaborative effort between the MTGSalvation staff. This week's edition is brought to you by accountant and MTGS content manager Alexandra Haggstrom.

The set remains in flux, but one thing is clear: If you're a god with a blue colour identity on Amonkhet, you're going to be worth something. Many of these gains will, of course, reverse over time as people realize that hyped-up cards aren't really all that, and new discoveries may be made, but the overall set EV will only trend downward to the cost of a box, so trying to make money at this point is basically gambling. On a week-to-week basis, it's possible to win big, such as with Champion of Wits, but you can also lose big, such as with Uncage the Menagerie. Unless you're a player in need of these cards for tournament play, it's better to wait for prices to come down a bit more before picking anything up with the intent to hold onto it.

The bottom half of the set shores up losses incurred by the top half of the set this week, leading to an actual, if minor, increase to the total value of the set. This comes at the cost of the Invocations dropping further in value, but in this case, flatter is indeed better, at least for players.

The Hour of Devastation Invocations lost tremendous value this week, to the tune of about two and a half percent of the total set value. That's quite significant when dealing with set values in the four-digit range, and unfortunately, we aren't likely to see the end of this downward motion any time soon. Part of it is that Masterpieces are almost always overvalued at the start, but another part of it is the lukewarm reception from players and collectors both, as compared to other Masterpiece sets. Many of the cards in Amonkhet Invocations feel like Wizards are scraping the bottom of the barrel to come up with ideas, and while even Zendikar Expeditions had notably underwhelming cards such as Tectonic Edge, the density here just feels greater. Even a relatively high-value Invocation such as Wrath of God doesn't feel quite as special as opening a fetchland or a card with Mox in the name, simply because it's been reprinted so many times and with multiple special printings, including a full-art textless variation. Focus on the other two Masterpiece sets if you want to seek value.

As Kaladesh block is no longer the go-to draft set for competitive play, comparatively little product is being opened, and as such, movements are going to be limited. Of note, however, is that the increasing number of efficient answers to Aether Revolt all-star Heart of Kiran means that it may not be long before Walking Ballista overtakes it in value. The smart money, of course, is elsewhere, so unless you're a fan of Vehicles decks, it's probably not worth holding onto Heart of Kiran.

Chandra, Torch of Defiance surges higher this week, as people realize that four-ability planeswalkers are actually rather strong. The rest of the set's actually doing quite well for itself as the metagame settles down. If you stuck through lower-value times holding onto Amonkhet cards, your patience is being rewarded.

It's a case of monkey see, monkey do this week as Mana Vault falls victim to another buyout. Its compatriot Pithing Needle illustrates that while it won't maintain such an inflated value forever, the price floor for the card has moved up significantly. If you're in the mood to play the market, there are several other Inventions just waiting to be bought out.

$100 Champion's Helm! Let's make it happen! All you have to do is buy every copy in sight and believe in yourself!

Liliana, the Last Hope is quite playable in Modern, so she won't lose too much value as rotation approaches, but don't hold onto any copies of her that you don't need. She'll probably settle around the $20 range, barring huge breakouts at the Pro Tour. The rest of the set isn't very noteworthy, and that includes Spell Queller's 33-cent jump.

There's a sizable subset of the Magic community that absolutely loves mill, and the Startled Awake combo will buoy that card's price for some time to come. In the long term, it may wind up the most valuable card in the set. How's that for startling?

As rotation approaches, high-value mythic rares drop in price. It's an old song and dance routine, and we all know it well. What do you do with a fading mythic, what do you do with a fading mythic, what do you do with a fading mythic, early in the morning? Put him in the back of the trading binder, put him in the back of the trading binder, put him in the back of the trading binder, early in the morning!

The elephant in the room here is Horizon Canopy. These data are actually slightly out of date, as the TCG Player mid price as of this writing is actually $214 USD. While it shouldn't remain the most expensive Expedition in the long term, if only due to the name brand power Scalding Tarn and Polluted Delta carry, it's still notable that such huge price shocks can happen so quickly to a set with such a small print run.

You know what this means. We can live the $100 Tectonic Edge dream if only someone has the courage to turn dreams into reality!

Overall Summary

Things are settling down in Standard, with Hour of Devastation providing the most interesting price movement. The most provocative news this week comes from the Masterpieces, and while there was some degree of jocularity in each individual set's commentary, the reality of the situation is that a lower density of Masterpiece sets combined with an uncertain future for certain cards provides tremendous opportunity for those with deep pockets to realize a little extra value by buying up good, playable Masterpieces that aren't likely to be reprinted. Obviously, Champion's Helm and Tectonic Edge are intentionally poor examples of this, as this author doesn't support gaming the Magic market like an unregulated market for financial instruments, but don't be surprised if we see similar jumps to Horizon Canopy's in the near future. Similar bubbles happen all the time in Magic, and while the value of foil versions of bad cards can be absolutely shattered by the ravages of time, there are only so many options for foil versions of many of the good cards reprinted as Masterpieces. Buying earlier rather than later is a prudent course of action for any Masterpiece you might want to play.